Brother Mouzone, meaning "judicious" in Arabic, is a drug enforcer and hitman from New York City. "The Brother" does not fit the usual picture of drug-trade "muscle", always wearing a suit, bowtie, and glasses, speaking politely and precisely. He is also quite erudite, reading magazines such as Harper's, The Atlantic, The New Republic, and The Nation. His dress, along with an extremely proper and pious persona is a manner typically associated with the Nation of Islam, more particularly its paramilitary wing, although it is never explicitly stated that he belongs to either organization. He reveals himself as a Muslim by mouthing "Allahu akbar" repeatedly after Omar shoots him, and he believes he is about to die. He is always accompanied by his "man" Lamar, who runs errands for Mouzone.

A shit-eating grin is a broad smile indicating self-awareness that may suggest self-satisfaction, smugness, discomfort, or embarrassment. The term is ambiguous and may indicate either a genuine broad smile, e.g. smug happiness, or a fake broad smile like when a person is trying to hide or get away with something.

The Battle of the Alamo was a pivotal event in the Texas Revolution. In the early morning hours of March 6, 1836, the Mexican Army advanced on the Alamo. After two prior attacks, Texians were unable to fend off a third attack and as Mexican soldiers scaled the walls, most of the Texian soldiers withdrew into interior buildings. Those defenders unable to reach these points were slain by the Mexican cavalry as they attempted to escape and in the end, all of the Texian defenders were killed. According to many accounts of the battle, between five and seven Texians surrendered. Incensed that his orders had been ignored, Santa Anna demanded the immediate execution of the survivors. Weeks after the battle, stories circulated that Crockett was among those who surrendered. However, Ben, a former American slave who cooked for one of Santa Anna's officers, maintained that Crockett's body was found surrounded by "no less than sixteen Mexican corpses". Santa Anna's cruelty during the battle inspired many Texians - both Texas settlers and adventurers from the United States - to join the Texian Army.

Last week John in Cheektowaga wrote in looking for a lead on some .22LR and I went through my usual schpeel on where to find (or in his case not find) some. But seeing how my supply is slowly dwindling over the last few months and could use a little pick me up, I decided to go out and try my hand at old-faithful: Walmart around 7am each morning when they restock the ammo shelves. But as my stomach was grumbling, I wanted to make myself a little breakfast before I hit the road. Two eggs, some toast and a hunk of smoked sausage later, and I was out the door just in time for the morning rush hour. Granted, the 'rush hour' down here in Cape Coral is nothing compared to that of the greater Boston area from back in the day, it was still a little frustrating and in between channel surfing and cursing at the guy in front of me, I first noticed the grumbling deep in my bowels. "Ha," I thought, "that damned sausage gets me every time." Over the course of the next few minutes the grumblings grew closer together, much like contractions before delivering a baby. And as the pressure knocking on my back door grew a little beyond my comfort zone, and I was on veteran's Parkway about halfway to Walmart when I leaned over to one side to see what couldn't be done about easing the situation a little bit.

There is a European wedding tradition for a bride to wear a garter to her wedding. As part of this European tradition, towards the end of the reception, the groom will remove his new wife's garter, which he tosses to the unmarried male guests. The symbolism to deflowering is unambiguous. Historically, this tradition relates to the belief that taking an article of the bride's clothing would bring good luck. In the Middle Ages, the groom's men would rush at the new bride to take her garters off her as a prize. As this often resulted in the destruction of the bride's dress, the tradition arose for the bride to surrender articles of her clothing, which were tossed to the guests, including the garter. Nowadays, the privilege of removing the bride's garter is reserved to the groom, while the bride will toss her bouquet.

I have not been comfortable for the past four days. In fact, there is no such concept as comfortable anymore, just varying degrees of less uncomfortable. My throat is raw from coughing and feels like I spent the weekend deepthroating a sandpaper covered cock. My stomach feels as if I've done five million situps. My quivering asshole is tender from being repeatedly wiped and recoils at the slightest touch. Every muscle aches. Oh, and I shit myself again, only this time was totally legit because of the flu and coughing.

A quick glance at the calender tells me that it's been roughly seven and a half years since I applied for, and was granted, a license to carry a concealed weapon here in the State of Florida. At the time the gun rights vs gun control debate was nowhere on the political landscape and thus the process for approving my application was rather quick; about seven or eight weeks from the time I fulfilled all of the requirements and mailed in my application, to the time it showed up in my mailbox. Part of that process, in addition to me submitting passport photos and providing a set of fingerprints to be kept on file, was a rather exhaustive background check performed by the State and FBI. For a point of reference, that's seven to eight weeks versus the quick 5-minute NICS jobbie that gets performed at the actual point of sale of a firearm purchase. I remember it was a few months later with permit in hand, I set out to purchase the second firearm I would ever own; a Benelli Supernova pump-action shotgun purchased from Bass Pro in Fort Myers. So you can imagine my surprise when the clerk asked me to fill out an instant background check form. "Don't have to, " I quickly (and naively) countered, "I have a Florida CCW." "Doesn't matter," The clerk replied with wad of chewing tobacco between his cheek and gum and an I-don't-give-a-fuck look on his face, "You still have to go call it in." And so I did and he did and I got my new shotgun, but I couldn't help but to marvel at what a colossal waste of fucking time it was. What the fuck did they hope to discover in 5 minutes that they hadn't already dug up over the last 8 weeks? But this bureaucratic bumblefuck goes on and on; every time I purchase a firearm from a licensed dealer, my permit is for naught and I have to wait in line with the rest of the cattle for an instant background check. And each time I feel like jumping over the counter, grabbing the phone and screaming at the person on the other end, "This is a complete fucking waste of your time and resources that could be much better spent finding someone who is fucking crazy!"

Today's 55-gallon drum resulted from military shipping requirements in World War II, the first war in which trucks, cold rolled steel, stamp or pattern forging machinery and welding were widely available. The drums helped win the Battle of Guadalcanal in the first U.S. offensive in the South Pacific Theater. The U.S. Navy could not maintain control of the seas long enough to offload aviation fuel for U.S. aircraft ashore, so the drums were often transported to the island on fast ships such as destroyers and shoved over the sides (or, time permitting, lowered in cargo nets). Aviation fuel is lighter than seawater, so the drums floated, and Navy Seabees in small craft corralled the drums. Drums are often re-conditioned and then later used for a variety of uses, including storing different liquids.

Some folks like to get away, Take a holiday from the neighborhood. Hop a flight to Miami Beach or to Hollywood. But I'm takin' a Greyhound on the Hudson River line. I'm in a New York state of mind. And here's the same event, only recorded from a different view. Props to the Piano Man Kid who is much better at playing the piano than he is at calculus!

Boy the ammo shortage is really bad out there. How bad is the ammo shortage? I'll tell you how bad the ammo shortage is. Man is suicidal. Wants to shoot himself with a 9mm handgun. Can't find any 9mm ammo. Literally, driving around town, no ammo to bad had. So he drives to Dick's and asks to see a shotgun. Grabs some ammo off the counter and using his (unloaded) handgun, forces the clerk to remove the shotgun's trigger lock. Then takes shotgun and ammo into bathroom, and kills himself. And me? This St Patrick's Day weekend I was fortunate enough -- FORTUNATE ENOUGH -- to be able to pick up six boxes of 7.62x39 at Walmart. Fortunate enough. So yeah, it's that bad out there.

Like plane crashes, train derailments have always captured my attention. To imagine the forces necessary to toss these gigantic creations around like children's toys is just mind boggling. For instance, the EMD SD70 is a series of diesel-electric locomotives produced by the Electro-Motive Division of General Motors in response to the GE Dash 9-44CW. Production commenced in late 1992 and since then over 4000 units have been produced; most of these are the SD70M and SD70MAC models, each weighing in at a hefty 415,000 pounds. So when I see a photo of one that has obviously been derailed, I'm always kind of shocked and amazed. I mean how the hell do they get 200 tons of steel to go from this to this? Cranes and weights and angles; it's got to be a monumental job, right? Well I still don't know how they do it, but I do know how they don't do it.

The traditional colors of Mardi Gras are purple, green, and gold. These colors are said to have been chosen by Grand Duke Alexis Alexandrovitch Romanoff of Russia during a visit to New Orleans in 1872. This doctrine was reaffirmed in 1892, when the Rex Parade theme "Symbolism of Colors" gave the three colors their meanings: purple for justice, gold for power, and green for faith. In his book "Krewe: The Early New Orleans Carnival: Comus to Zulu," Errol Laborde shows the above mentioned meanings of the Mardi Gras colors to be false. He gives a much simpler origin, having to do primarily with looking good.